The Matrix is Broken, so Neo and Trinity Are Coming Back to Fix It

Stop your spoon-bending!Variety has just confirmed Keanu Reeves and Carrie-Ann Moss will return to their iconic, turn-of-the-century characters Neo and Trinity for a new sequel of The Matrix, written and directed by Lana Wachowski:

Warner Bros. Pictures and Village Roadshow Pictures will produce and globally distribute the film. Warner Bros. Picture Group chairman Toby Emmerich made the announcement on Tuesday.

“We could not be more excited to be re-entering ‘The Matrix’ with Lana,” said Emmerich. “Lana is a true visionary — a singular and original creative filmmaker — and we are thrilled that she is writing, directing and producing this new chapter in ‘The Matrix’ universe.”

In addition to Wachowski, the script was also written by Aleksandar Hemon and David Mitchell. Wachowski is also producing with Grant Hill. Sources say the film is eyed to begin production at the top of 2020.

The fact I’m still using my silly moniker, 20 years after the original film came out and forever changed the Sci-Fi genre –and despite the fact the “red pill” concept has been hijacked by ‘alt-right’ pendejos— shows how much of a fan of the series I still am. Yep, even Reloaded and Revolutions – heck I even bought Animatrix and played Enter the Matrix! — so I’m taking this bombshell news with… trepidation. Hooray for Lana being behind the wheel on this one, but where’s her sister Lilly? (The last time we heard of her, she was pulling out of the Netflix series Sense8 she was co-directing with Lana, to “focus on her well-being” after coming out as transgender). Awesome that Carrie-Ann will play Trinity (um, didn’t she die in the 3rd one??) but you can’t have a proper Matrix movie without Laurence Fishburne as Morpheus, dammit!

There’s also the issue that the world is a much different place than when the Wachowskis first invited us to jack into their philosophy-rich exploration about the nature of Reality, and the complicated relationship between human beings and Artificial Intelligence. In these two decades the idea that we may very well be living in a computer simulation has turned from improbable science-fiction to a legitimate scientific discussion. We’ve also seen A.I. jump from something only nerds and geeks would worry about in comic book conventions to an issue already starting to affect our daily lives (from Facebook algorithms to Uber driverless cars) in ways that will exponentially increase in the years to come –if the last Cold War was about who had the most nukes, the next one might be about who gets to control more data and which heuristic digital tools gives you the most dominance over your commercial competitors… and your population.

20 years ago, Virtual Reality still seemed far away in the horizon, but with the advent of Oculus Rift and similar head-mounted display systems, it looks like “soft” VR for the masses is already here, if you have the means to afford it. Of course, these technologies are not immersive enough for a true virtual reality experience in which the synthetic world is indistinguishable from the real one, but that’s when biomedical interfaces like Elon Musk’s Neuralink might come in.

Speaking of being unable to distinguish between a real image and a synthetic one, the rapid rise of “Deep Fakes” is a disturbing reminder that our feeble grasp between reality and simulacra is only getting thinner.

And with a concept that also didn’t exist back when The Matrix was released —the Mandela Effect— it’s no wonder that perfectly sane individuals (at least on a functional level) begin to wonder whether their reality has been suddenly switched by some evil programmer with an unhealthy fixation with 80s cartoons.

I mean, let’s be honest here, you guys: When you wake up in 2019 and check your social media only to discover that belief in a Flat Earth is on the rise, US Navy pilots are going on the record admitting they’ve engaged in dogfights with giant Tic-Tacs, and the president of the most powerful nation in the world is bitching over the fact he can’t buy freaking Greenland, anybody can be excused for fleetingly entertaining the possibility that maaaybe the Matrix has gone gaga and is in desperate need of a restart. If the script addresses all of this from an intelligent and engaging perspective, instead of trying to fill in all the logical gaps left by the original trilogy, then Matrix 4 has a solid chance of being another modern classic — but seriously, get a hold of Fishburne, people! Matrix Rebooted. How about it Warner Bros? Don’t bother with sending me a check, just invite me to the red carpet so I can have a bullet-time selfie with Carrie-Ann.

Agnostic gnostic, walking conundrum & metaphysical oxymoron (with emphasis in the 'moron' part), the mysterious RPJ leaves a double life: By day he serves as Grand Master of the International Sacred Order of Lucha Libre, but at night he pursues his life-long study of everything considered mysterious and/or 'paranormal' --a term he personally detests...
When he's not exploring the web looking for his daily fix of Forteana, he can be found blogging, doodling, fooling around and offering his services as news administrator and writer at The Daily Grail. He also regularly participates in other websites and podcasts like Mysterious Universe, The Grimerica Show and Where Did the Road Go?
He impatiently awaits for the return of the mothership in Mexico City.
absurdbydesign.com

2 Responses

Think of a video game. You have to load the game(The Matrix) before you can play the game(Reloaded/Revolutions). The actual story is Reloaded/Revolutions, The Matrix was the prequel.

They had to do The Matrix first to prepare the Zeitgeist for the actual story(Reloaded/Revolutions). The shock of the trailers alone had massive impact, changing society. Commercials that riffed off The Matrix, even a Buffy episode, prepared everyone to accept Reloaded/Revolutions when it came out years later.

– Remember, Neo was “The One”, but he wasn’t the only one.

– The Architect will follow the agreement, but he is not the only longterm program in the system with their own agenda.

Don’t forget the humans. There were a number of kids in the Oracle’s apartment that could also manipulate “Reality”, and they keep being generated by the Matrix. Such people could use their ability to manipulate the Matrix for their own agenda, becoming monsters.

The next sequence of films probably happen long after Morpheus’ death. A young Morpheus only means that he was instantiated again, after a new Neo and Trinity. None of them will remember prior lives, because they are different people.

You need to watch the whole story again, The Matrix(prequel) and the actual story(Reloaded/Revolutions) with the full understanding of what happened before, and you will see the story as intended.

– If you have problems with Reloaded/Revolutions, then you will have real problems with the next sequence of films.

Though I enjoyed the sequels the first movie was a complete package that really didn’t need to be expanded (outside of making money of course). Reloaded and Revolutions were inferior and overly complicated Imo. I’ve never accepted the ending 😆